As the seventh meeting of the Women Speakers of Parliament on â€˜Gender-Sensitive Parliamentsâ€™ got underway here on Wednesday, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director of UN Women Michelle Bachelet made a spirited plea for passing the Bill providing for reservation of one-third seats for women in Parliament.

Bachelet hailed India on progressive reservations that have brought a sharp increase in women leaders in gram panchayats, and said that the â€œworld was awaitingâ€ the fate of the Womenâ€™s Reservation Bill at the national level......

Why wouldn't they wait? They will party to the fact that roughly one-third of the men will become ineligible for office with the flick of a signature. And the crooked politicians will rejoice as well as it gives them a change to field their wives or daughters or daughter-in-laws thereby making puppet women leaders rather than real women leaders.

Actually India Inc has higher percentage of women CEOs than even advanced countries. Of course that does not mean that the average Indian woman is better off than say a woman in the West. Still, women in India have many advantages in law already. This is especially true for Hindu women. In the present scenario reservation for women in Parliament will only mean wives,daughters, daughters-in-law, etc will act as proxy for powerful male politicians.

Biggest liberation for women will be when personal law for Muslims and divorce law for Christians are allowed to be modernised. In the case of Muslims , polygamy and triple talaq is a big tool to beat down women. For Christians, an archaic law framed in th 1800's that makes divorce very hard.

Reservation for women,without empowering them with education is meaning less.See the condition of the panchayats .In majority cases,husbands manage the work and the ladies simply sign.This can only be succeseeful only when we cross 60% level in women education.